The great drawback to Tripoli is its proximity to the desert, which, after walking through a belt of palms on the land side of the town—itself built on a peninsula—one may see rolling away to the horizon. The gardens and palm groves are watered by a peculiar system, the precious liquid being drawn up from the wells by ropes over pulleys, in huge leather funnels of which the lower orifice is slung on a level with the upper, thus forming a bag. The discharge is ingeniously accomplished automatically by a second rope over a lower pulley, the two being pulled by a bullock walking down an incline. The lower lip being drawn over the lower pulley, releases the water when the funnel reaches the top.
The weekly market, Sôk et-Thláthah, held on the sands, is much as it would be in the Gharb el[page 331] Jawáni, as Morocco is called in Tripoli. The greater number of Blacks is only natural, especially when it is noted that hard by they have a large settlement.
It would, of course, be possible to enter into a much more minute comparison, but sufficient has been said to give a general idea of Tripoli to those who know something of Morocco, without having entered upon a general description of the place. From what I saw of the country people, I have no doubt that further afield the similarity between them and the people of central and southern Morocco, to whom they are most akin, would even be increased.
[page 332]
XXXV
FOOT-PRINTS OF THE MOORS IN SPAIN
"Every one buries his mother as he likes."